What merger? T-Mobile is doing exactly what it promised — moving on regardless of Sunday’s merger news. Data junkies will salivate at this one: the carrier has announced the first cities to get its 42Mbps network upgrade.

New York City, Las Vegas, and Orlando would be the first cities to see the high-speed service. Chicago will follow soon after along with the Long Island, NY and northern New Jersey. These speed boosts would “theoretically” double maximum speeds in these areas, and it expects by mid year to have increased speeds in about 25 markets covering some 140 million people.

A host of devices will complement this speed upgrade including the T-Mobile Rocket 3.0, a USB dongle which would be the first 42Mbps capable device from the company launching in late Spring. In all, 25 4G capable devices will be launched this year it says.

Real world tests of T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network have shown that speeds average anywhere between 7-9Mbps. So it’s not out of the question that you’d expect with these upgrades for that speed to double. Thats pretty impressive and generally puts it on par with modern cable Internet broadband connections.

I’ve seen a lot of talk post merger announcement about how it would hurt the company and drive customers away. If T-Mobile continues to be aggressive like this they have nothing to worry about.

I just can't see myself ever switching to a carrier which I am not sure I would get phone service everywhere I went no matter how fast their internet access is. If tmobile has verizon's coverage, I'd switch.